Cycle of Heartbreak
by lackofname
Summary: Again. And again. And again... Majora's Mask, Link-centric; no pairing


Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the Zelda series…

Yes, yes, rather than writing my two Kingdom Hearts fics, I had to get this out. Why, you ask?

Because Majora's Mask is, without a doubt, the most devastating game Nintendo has ever produced…at least, it was for me. And during a rather random bout of deep contemplation, this wound up writing itself.

Hope you enjoy and review!

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In a twisted sort of way, it was like falling in love.

That was the only explanation that meant anything to him. The hopeless, stricken idea that he had fallen in love. Such fragile, would-be meaningful words hardly began to truly encompass what the emotion truly was. He was spiralling into love. Being dragged down into it's depths and crushed by the pressure.

Link had fallen in love with three days.

An entire community of people, milling so-familiar streets with purpose that ultimately would mean absolutely nothing. Heads filled with missions that they could only complete with his help. Ideas and emotions that he watched cascade into the same hollow darkness he was forced to feel, the closer the moon got. And it did get closer, with each passing hour. Link had memorised, by now, where it would be at every single waking moment of the day.

Then when he had stopped staying awake during the daytime, knowing that a different set of people needed his assistance come nightfall, he memorised where it would be every waking hour of the night instead.

He knew where it would be when the ranch girl would be abducted, if – when – he failed to make that journey down Milk Road.

The position of the moon wasn't all he knew about. He knew the exact time the old woman would be mugged, in the North section of Clock Town. He knew when the shady-looking Gorman Brothers would attack Cremia, during her journey to the Milk Bar…if she made the journey at all. He knew when it would crush Anju and Kafei, be they separated or together, wound in an embrace that transcended perceived age. He knew how the crash would coincide with the unfair conviction of an innocent creature – a monkey – whose sentence was ultimately shared with his Deku oppressors anyway.

There was so much more he knew, as well, that were unaffected by the passage of time. Throughout three days, those things were the same. The Goron child would cry for his father, who would never return. Lulu would stare voicelessly at the ocean, longing for her unborn children who would never emerge from their membrane prisons. That little girl, trapped inside her house in Ikana, would never be able to save her suffering father.

Not without him.

And he could only help a handful at a time, at best. Guide them to an almost-satisfying conclusion, before the moon would crash into the town – directly into Link's childish body, it felt like – and it would all start over again.

Those final, intense hours marked the end of Link's desperate, loving bid at the heroism he was so addicted to. It didn't matter that he had been pushed into such a grim situation with no justice, no choice. It was simply in his nature to eventually be drawn in. To emotionally invest in the acts he did, in a manner far too mature for his childish body.

Link grew more sensitive as the cycle kept repeating. And repeating. And repeating.

It hadn't been so difficult in the beginning. He had barely known what he was doing, in the first place. He hadn't known the people, whose faces he now knew as well as his own. The people who he had to introduce himself to, again and again and again and again…

The people he fell in love with, who he would do anything for, to help…and give even more of himself if they would _stay helped._ For them to remember him, for it grew more painful each time someone he had met nigh on a hundred times to look at him with the blank non-recognition of a stranger.

Three days also gave him time to think. When he had gone through yet another cycle and temporarily lost all will to keep going, that only left him to his troubled thoughts.

Like the masks.

He wore the faces of the dead. The dead, who he loved, too…if only because others loved _them_, so.

The Gorons recognised Darmani. The Zoras knew Mikau. And while no one seemed to know the little Deku boy whose face he put on, Link had a sickening feeling regarding the dried, dead tree he'd once glimpsed, when this whole thing had started…

Upon thinking about it, realising exactly what he was doing…it was utterly sick. False hope was not a crime, but it tugged his conscience darkly. What kind of man was he, to parade about in someone else's face, to reap the benefits from _their_ life?

He tried to argue that it was necessity.

Then the moon would fall, and he would have to do it again. It stopped seeming like necessity after the fifth time. Tenth time. Twentieth.

Again, and again, and again…

Part of Link realised that he was only doing what he needed to. Everything built towards the greater good…and he knew that doing what he did would, one day – one day, in a cycle of three – he would save them all. He would stop the moon from falling, retrieve the evil mask haunting his nightmares, and ensure that the dead received the honour they deserved.

On the fourth day, there would be a wedding. Link wished he could see it, but knew he would already be on his way then. No doubt Anju would glow, being walked down the aisle, led to an adult Kafei with both of them blushing as they vowed the rest of their lives to the other.

Lulu would perform at the concert, with the rest of the band. Perhaps their songs would be the best tribute to Mikau they could give.

The Goron child would cry, no doubt. But the Elder Goron would finally make it to his side, by then. He would soothe him with his father's lullaby, and they would rest easier knowing that Darmani died as valiant a warrior as he was in life.

Those monkeys in the swamp would go free, and the Deku princess would go back to her pampered lifestyle…and their King would have learned caution in his rule. The witch-like sisters would run their business, as usual.

Link would be long gone, when it all happened. He would never see it happen. But he would know there was peace.

On that fourth day.

The fourth day that still never came, as the three-day cycle rewound itself again…and again…and _again_…

Link's heart would break a little more each time. Again. And again.

He knew he was going crazy. Each time, he grew a little more reckless, after all. He got a little more careless. He lost patience a bit faster. He broke down so much more easily…all it took was one missed minute, and his world crashed down around him.

Link could hear it within the echoing chambers of his mind. It sounded like the moon crashing into the ground.

Again.

And again.

Maddening.

Heartbreaking.

What was left of the blood-pumping muscle was beating louder to compete with the rumbling.

Five minutes left until midnight.

Again.

Another night plagued with the reminder that every death was on his hands. And they weren't even the deaths of strangers anymore.

Remembering that those deaths weren't permanent. That they would live the last three days of their lives just so they could die again.

Due to Link's failure. No matter what he had accomplished that time, he had still ultimately failed.

Again.

The stone nose-tip of the moon's carved face was just beginning to touch the top of the Clock Tower.

And so the cycle of heartbreak would continue.

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